The Kerinci Valley is home to more than 300,000 residents, most of whom are farmers, with 400 being smallholder coffee farmers, yet few people know about this place. Dubbed as the secret valley by the Dutch in the 1700’s, it was and is still considered a gem with rich volcanic soil and protective ecosystem. Located on the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, nestled in the middle of a lush rainforest and national park, it’s greatest asset also acts as it’s biggest challenge -it’s only accessible by three roads.

Without proper support and infrastructure, coffee farmers are faced with the nearly impossible task of introducing their specialty coffee to a global market, not to mention access to quality resources. Thanks to an incredible effort by the conservation foundation, local co-op leadership and the dedication of Craig and Susan Owen, from Santiang Exports, Kerinci farmers have a chance.

Working Towards Economic Sustainability

Craig and Susan Owen, came to Sumatra 15 years ago and fell in love with the people. They decided to stay and raise their two girls there. Their dream was to make a difference, to use their talents to contribute to their community and give this farming community access to better wages. Sounds like a tall order, but putting their Agricultural Economics and Chemical Engineering degrees to good use, they began to work with the local community on creating sustainable economic development and environmental conservation initiatives.

In 2005, they started their company, Santiang Exports, because they saw a need to help coffee farmers, collectors, and processors gain access to a market that was difficult to access. Not just desiring to be another rung on the chain but committed to solving a problem that needed solving. To this day, their commitment to their partners has been unwavering. On one end, they strive to create traceability, quality, and consistency for their buyers. On the other end they are building an infrastructure for better wages by bringing a fair market value and creating access to better resources -they have built drying beds for farmers in one village and in another village, motivated the government to build processing facilities.

Craig and Susan Owen here with their good friends, Ibu Emma, Pak Sukianto, and Pak Mulyadi. (left to right)

Working towards Environmental Sustainability

For Kerinci locals, being right in the middle of a National Park has had it's challenges. The Kerinci Seblat National Park is one of the largest protected areas in all of Southeast Asia. "It includes 5325 square miles of rainforest, volcanoes, mountains, wetlands, and rivers – that’s more protected forest than in all of Costa Rica and more than 1.5 times the size of Yellowstone. About 7 million people in Sumatra rely on the water sourced from these forests.” The city of Kerinci sits right in the middle of it, like a donut hole, and as the city grows, so have the tensions to encroach on those park boundaries. With only 3 roads in and out of the valley, many locals see this is as a detriment to their growth and survival.

Yet thanks to the work of the local conservation foundation called Lembaga Tumbuh Alami (LTA) run by husband and wife team, Pak Mulyadi and Ibu Emma, they have been working diligently to educate and shift thinking to help farmers understand that this protected land is actually helping the quality of their crops. Through years of relationship building the LTA has gained a level of trust and respect in that community. For coffee farmers, they act as a co-op, selling them seedlings at a reduced price and then, when the tree produces coffee, they give them back a fair market price. In turn, farmers promise not to encroach on national park land. This program has become incredibly successful with 400 smallholder farmers participating, which then enables them to actively participate in the specialty coffee market.

The Trouble Surrounding Wet-Hulled Coffee

So what about the coffee? Can this coffee be what breaks through the stigma surrounding traditional Indonesian coffee?

As Q Graders with years of experience, Craig and Susan know the challenges very well. Traditionally, wet-hulled coffees have been known to have a woody and even musty cup profile. However, the environmental conditions of Kerinci as well as the variation in processing quality can greatly affect the flavor.

As far as environment, this is best scenario for Sumatra. "The climate and elevation of the Kerinci Highlands is ideal for Arabica production. With the surrounding rainforests (something that other parts of Sumatra don’t benefit from) and the stabilizing effects on the weather and rain that rainforests bring, coffee ripens on the branch almost year round with two full harvests each year.”

And regarding quality, Craig and Susan work hard to improve quality controls and refine production processes. They work towards 100% hand-picked red cherries, precise drying, meticulous sorting and careful storing and shipping. The result- you won’t be disappointed! This coffee has sweet caramel and spicy cinnamon flavor notes as well as bright acidity not often found in Sumatran coffees, while still maintaining a rich full body.

This team is breaking new ground in the Indonesian specialty market. They are dedicated to raising the standard of Sumatran coffee and changing the stigma from musty to the cleanest Sumatran coffee you’ll ever have!

We are so honored to work with them! Join us as we support this amazing community and strive to create better wages for these hard working farming and processing families.

They may only have three roads but are open to a world of possibility.

We are wired for adventure, searching for the next discovery, the next challenge. Whether it’s on a mountaintop, a rocky beach, on the edge of glacial lake surrounded by nothing by trees and open skies, or the wind whipping your hair on the sea, your coffee should be there with you. The coffee we enjoy today comes from a long history of adventure and exploration. Coffee has traveled the world through ancient trade routes, affairs of the European nobility and long sea voyages the world-over.

Discovered by a goat herder in 800 A.D., monks used to drink the beverage, made by grinding the berries into power and dissolving in water, to stay awake during long prayers. When the Arabs discovered the beverage in 1000 A.D., the brought it across the Red Sea and began drinking to ward off evil spirits. Coffee continued to make its way around the world through ancient trade routes and over raging seas. In the 1700s, coffee came to Central and South America thanks to a thieving French naval captain (who is said to have stolen a bean from Louis XIV’s “Nobel Tree”) and a Brazilian Lieutenant Colonel who received a coffee bean from the wife of French Guiana’s governor, with whom he was having an affair!

With a history so full of adventure, a great cup of coffee should have no boundaries, and now it doesn’t. Torch Coffee is excited to introduce Torch Adventure Coffee. Packaged in a light-weight package, Adventure Coffee is easy to carry and easy to make. You don't need to pack a Chemex or Aeropress to get that specialty coffee brew any longer. Adventure coffee offers you the ease and convenience without the overbearing equipment or messy cleanup. The foldable, pocket-sized filter was designed as a simple pour over, providing you with an amazing cup of coffee anywhere, anytime.

1. Choose your roast -Medium or Dark Roast!

2. Tear open the filter, pull the tabs and secure on your coffee mug.

3. Pour about 250mL (1 cup) of water over the grounds. Be sure to first wet all the grounds and let bloom for 30 seconds. (In the coffee world bloom means allowing the CO2 gases to escape for enhanced flavor). Then pour water to fill filter and let it seep down into the cup. Repeat 3x until cup is full.

4. Remove the filter and enjoy a delicious cup of coffee!

Available in both medium and dark roast, the beans are roasted to order and ground fresh to guarantee the same freshness and taste you enjoy at home. As always, our beans are sustainably sourced from farmers as we hope to empower through coffee. Adventure Coffee is perfect for camping, hiking, backpacking, camping, rock climbing and more! We’re excited to see how you experience your Adventure Coffee! Share on Instagram or Facebook with #awakenyouradventure to tell your adventure story!

Coffee.... is a fruit. It's easy to forget that when we strip the flesh from it, roast it, grind it and extract liquor from it. Have you ever tasted the difference between a perfectly ripened peach and one picked too early in order to export it overseas? The difference is astounding! The sweet, juicy, crisp peach satisfies your tastebuds like nothing else. Why would we expect differently from coffee? Harvesting cherries at the wrong time could be what makes your coffee amazing or what gives you the same indistinct coffee as everyone else.

Picking an unripe cherry could potentially give you an immature, broken, chipped, cut, or quaker bean. Picking an overripe cherry could give you either a full or partially sour bean, as well as a full or partially black bean.

Two of the defects listed in the handbook, both “Cherry Pod” and fungus, are potentially created by harvesting cherries from the ground. The remaining five defects potentially develop from picking the cherries from the tree at the wrong time.

Because there is a direct correlation between bean quality and cup quality, it is safe to say that each one of these listed defects above impacts the quality and flavor of the cupped coffee in a negative way. Easily stated, properly picked cherries produce a better quality of coffee as compared to improperly picked cherries.

The SCAA Arabica “Green Coffee Defect Handbook” states the following about cup quality of each of the defects:

Immature/Quaker beans generally imparts grassy, straw-like or greenish flavors and is the main source of astringency in coffee. (Like eating any other unripe fruit, you will taste more of the structural material of the fruit and not the perfectly developed sugars and acids that people love)

Broken/Chipped/Cut beans can cause earthy, dirty, sour, or fermented beans. (This due to the bacteria growth that takes place in and on the cracks and chips)

Dried Cherry/Pods/Fungus bean imperfections can cause fermented, moldy, or phenolic taste. (What a harvester might see as a opportunity not to waste, the barista see's as a road block to a clean cup)

Full/Partial Sour and Full/Partial Black bean imperfections can produce sour, fermented, or even a stinker taste. (Allowing coffee cherries, aka fruit, to over-ripen on the tree has dire consequences to flavor of the cup)

Immature beans can be filtered out systematically during the washed method of processing coffee by removing the floaters when the coffee is submersed in water. While this is an effective method, it is not necessarily efficient due to the large amounts of beans that are removed. It is also not extensive in removing all defects. In order to produce a washed coffee efficiently or a high value natural coffee, proper picking remains imperative.

While improving harvesting may be as simple as declaring each bean as either ripe or not ripe, implementing high harvest standards can be very complex due to the fact that all specialty coffee is harvest by manual labor. Thus, improving harvesting requires a highly compensated and well trained work force in order to achieve higher standards.

Having a good understanding and enough knowledge about the particular variety that is being harvested is crucial for harvesting ripe cherries. Each and every variety has its own color profile at full maturity. Below is a photo that clearly shows the differing colors of different coffee varieties from immaturity to full maturity.

Some additional ways to consider for improving coffee harvesting are:

Compensating harvesters based on the quality of cherries that they deliver to the mill. The quality can be measured with a cherry ripeness board in order to establish a sample percentage of their delivery, grading how much is ripe versus unripe.

Display color charts in several locations around the coffee farm or receiving bay of the mill, in order to clearly show the color of your coffee varieties ripeness color.

Do not mix or interplant different varieties of coffee in the same field.

Harvest a particular tree/field more often in order to pick the cherries as the ripen.

When harvesting, double check the color of the cherry closest to the stem as it is the last section of the branch to change color.

Twist cherries off the stem with ease. If they will not twist off easily, they are not ready to be harvested.

AN INTERVIEW WITH BEN CARLSON OF LONG MILES COFFEE

The Carlson Family in Burundi, Africa

We recently had the privilege to interview Ben Carlson of Long Miles Coffee Project and hear about his experience living in Burundi and his heart towards unlocking potential in these special people. Well worth the read!

Tell me a little bit about how the idea of Long Miles Coffee Project came about and what drew you to Burundi.

Well, I had been in coffee previously as a coffee trader but it really came about when my wife and I were living in South Africa working for a non-profit organization. I was consulting in coffee on the side, just because I love coffee. The country of Burundi had just privatized the coffee sector and somehow this company found me. They asked me to come to Burundi and do some cuppingto see what the chances were of having specialty micro-lots coming from the country.

So I Googled Burundi…this was back in 2009…and thought, “wow, this is kind of scary. Let’s do it!” My wife and I had decided that she was going to go into photography full-time and I knew that I wanted to do something with coffee but I didn’t know what. I didn’t want to be a roaster. My wife had run a coffee shop for a year and sold it and I knew I didn’t want to run any coffee shops. And so, what else do you do? Then I said, “Oh, I’ll be a coffee buyer.” Then I got the chance to go and consult. I was in Burundi for two weeks and I said, "this is it!" It has the most amazing potential of coffee and it’s not being done well. And it’s still one of the best coffees I’ve ever had. Nobody was doing it at the time, the coffee is amazing, and I knew it could get even better.

How long have you and Kristy been in Burundi?

Well, this will be our sixth coffee season. But it’s just over five years.

Coffee in Burundi comes from hills, multiple families contributing to each “batch” of coffee. Tell me a little bit about how that works.

A lot of people think of this guy from Colombia and, here he comes with his donkey and his coffee. He washes it and he dries it and then he goes and sells it to Folgers or whoever. In Central America, there are these single estate coffees – which is why you get people asking, “Oh, is it an estate coffee?” Where as in Burundi, and a lot of East Africa, every coffee you get is made up of hundreds, if not thousands of farmers, working together to make one small lot of coffee. Long Miles is a washing station – a place for the families to bring their picked cherries to wash and process them, preparing them for roasters - serves about 3,500 families.

So if you look at the coffee that Torch is getting, it’s coming from a single hill, and that lot was made up of 200 different families. Most families have an average of 150 trees. And their production levels are less than a kilo of coffee cherries per tree. So, the reality is there is just not enough land for farmers to have more trees. We’re talking about the poorest country in the world. When I started, I would go around to all these washing stations and each washing station would have anywhere from 500 to 800 to 1,000 families. I cupped those coffees and found the best areas. It was through this process that I realized, through trial and error, these families are subsistence living. They are literally digging up what they’re going to eat today and coffee is what enables them to send one or two of their kids to school, maybe put a roof on their house or be able to pay for a wedding. It’s the one time they get cash a year.

Burundi has had a very difficult past and even now, there is a lot of turmoil. Do you believe the coffee industry in Burundi has the potential to become a stabilizing force in the country in the midst of the current tense political and social tensions?

I definitely think so. I was just at the US Embassy yesterday, and there was a guy from the European Union there who leads the political arm of the EU. As we were talking, we realized that for Long Miles to succeed, we need a stable government so that we can do business; so that we are not hindered exporting; so that there are advantageous tax codes being written and there is not an undue risk of us losing our business, we need that.

At the same time, 70% of Burundi’s GDP comes from coffee. So if coffee does not affect change in Burundi, the country is in big trouble. So, I think we went into Burundi seeing the potential of how good it (the coffee) could be, but also thinking coffee can change Burundi. Part of it is this, I’m a coffee guy and I’m drinking my own kool-aid. I’ve had lots of other coffee people tell me I’m naive; that it’s just this country and the political situation is messed up, and it’s never gonna get any better.

What we’ve seen from Long Miles perspective is, we can’t wait for the political situation to correct itself so that we can do business and affect change. The reality is that that may never happen. So are we willing to invest our lives as a family, our entire livelihood into a place that is politically unstable and may not have the hope of changing? And I guess.....we’ve done it, we are doing it, we’re all in, and here we are.

What do you think it would take for the coffee industry to grow before the political tensions are resolved?

I think what it comes down to is, coffee producers like Long Miles and our neighbor coffee producers have to start focusing on quality coffee. I think specialty coffee is the only way for Burundi to become economically viable in the coffee sector and as a country. That means we need more coffee producers to invest more in nurseries, in fertilizers, in mulch. Really, at a grassroots level, help the hundreds, and even thousands, of families that we each work with.

The only way we see change is if we invest in their (the farmers) lives and help their lives change and help them invest in their farms. And when they have a better life and their coffee is growing healthier and with a better quality, then it’s going to get more revenue for them as a family; it’s going to get more revenue for us as a producer; it’s going to get more tax revenue for the country. And then, for companies like Torch, they’re going to be happier and happier because now they have a relationship with a coffee producer that’s getting year after year, better and better quality. And then you as coffee drinker are like, “Man, this coffee just keeps getting better and better!”

That commitment to getting better year over year, that comes with your Trust Mark. Can you tell me a little bit more about that?

Our Trust Mark is just another way in which we bring the human element to what we do. It is a symbol of the relationship that the roaster has sought us out intentionally with the desire to build a relationship. They want to invest time and money into the people growing their coffee and in return, we commit to making the coffee we sell them each year better and better.

It’s just one way in which we strive to bring the human element to coffee. It’s just another way that we can invest in our farmers; help improve their lives.

Given everything that has happened, how do you stay focused on your mission? Is it hard to remember why you’re there?

We have a strong faith in God and we’re doing this for more than just making a profit. We want to see a transformation in community. If you’re transcending personal gain, it makes it easier to get through those rough days. That is our driving focus; something that gives us the ability to say, “It’s worth sticking with it.” Because grit alone is not going to keep us in Burundi.

And for us as a family, this is no side project, no NGO. We’re here because this is our family’s life. We have two farms, and we’re here to export coffee. We’re farmers and producers and exporters. This is our life. If this doesn’t work, then there’s nothing. In a sense, we’ve said, “We’re with you Burundi. We’re with you, farmers.” We’re farming, we’re terracing, we’re mulching, we’re searching for fertilizer with them, we’re fighting against the insects with them. If it doesn’t rain, we’re crying with them, if it rains we’re rejoicing with them. It’s life. It’s bigger than just a project or a volunteer thing.

At the end of the day, what is the most important aspect of Long Miles Coffee Project? What is the driving force behind what you do, day in and day out?

The thing we’ve really been talking about lately is just this idea of making coffee human. The human element of it. Coffee is human. How many times do hands touch each bean before it gets to the roaster – picking, sorting, floating, picking out, pulping, fermenting, grating, rinsing, pre-drying and triaging it and then drying it and triaging it again? There are over seven quality steps require human hands.

We’re constantly relying upon the human element. That’s the vision of Long Miles. Coffee. People. Potential. Coffee brought us to Burundi, but it’s really about the people. It’s about a community that can realize potential. If fact, you can see that if you follow our Instagram account. Kristi does the photography and we work really hard to capture the faces of our farmers. A lot of people, when they think about a company they think about the logo or the type-face. We don’t want that. When people think about Long Miles, we want them to think about the people, the farmers who make this happen. We really believe that we need to be advocates for making coffee human. And I think we’re starting to see the change we knew could happen in our communities.

Torch is honored to partner with Ben and Kristy as they fight to make coffee human, bringing the story of those who make it to the forefront. Check out their blog at http://www.longmilescoffeeproject.com/blog/ and instagram @longmilescoffee to follow their story and the events in Burundi that have influenced their lives in the last few years.

Thanks for taking the journey with us! Support these awesome people and Burundi by buying their coffee now!

Introducing our newest coffee and partnership with people dedicated to bring out the best of Burundi

At Torch, we believe in providing opportunity through coffee. As the second most traded commodity in the world and the livelihood of more than twenty million people, coffee can have an incredible impact. For us, it’s the people, the relationships that create that impact. Torch seeks out others that believe as we do; by investing in the human aspect of coffee we can change thousands of lives for the better.

So we are thrilled to announce a new partnership with the Long Miles Coffee Project from Burundi, Africa. Mutana Hill, meaning “we are with you always,” is available to order now. Mutana Hill comes from the edge of the Kibira forest and carries a lemon scent, boasting flavors of lemon, raspberry, and floral notes. The milky body and Asian pear finish provide a beautiful and unique coffee experience.

When we first talked about doing development work, we knew we needed to go where help was most needed and least available. Burundi is just that kind of place and Long Miles Coffee Project is a family run company bringing that idea to life.

A land-locked country just south of Rwanda, Burundi is the poorest country in the world. Twelve years of civil war between 1993 and 2006, fueled by racial tensions between Hutus and Tutsis, left an already poor country in tatters. Ninety percent of Burundi’s population works in agriculture and coffee is its most traded commodity, the backbone of the economy. For many families, selling coffee marks the difference between having food and going hungry. It’s easy to see the despair, the lingering effects of war and the anxiety over current, growing political and racial tensions. Yet Ben and Kristy Carlson, founders of the Long Miles Coffee Project, see one thing above all of that – potential.

Rolling hills make up Burundi's landscape, dotted with a patchwork of small, family-run farms. Most Burundians live off their small pieces of land, surviving on what comes out of that plot every day. Coffee is their cash-crop, the one chance they have every year to make money to send their kids to school or pay for their daughter’s wedding. They grow some of the best coffee in the world – Arabica Bourbon. With elevations of over 1,600 meters, microclimates are perfect for producing high-quality coffee. Communities are built around hills, or collides, and each batch of coffee is made up of the cherries from more than a hundred family plots. Mutana Hill is the product of more than five hundred families.

Long Miles Coffee Project is a washing station in their sixth coffee season in Burundi. What started as a simple dream to be coffee people has turned into a mission Ben and Kristy couldn’t have imagined. With the human element at the core of what they do, Long Miles provides processing for over three thousand families. Everything, with the exception of depulping, is done by hand to ensure the highest quality product, to be sold at the best price so that farmers and their families can hope for a better way of life. Education is vital to what they do, providing agronomists to the farmers to help create high yields and better sustainability so that future generations can continue to build and grow. Ben and Kristy don’t just advise and process; they farm their own land. Their boys help. They work with their neighboring farmers, attend to the trees with them, search for fertilizer with them, anxiously watch the weather with them, hope with them, dream with them.

It is an honor and a privilege for Torch to represent Burundi coffee farming families and work with an organization like Long Miles Coffee. Through building relationships with farmers and roasters, Ben and Kristy are able to provide a consistent, stable income for thousands of people. Through this partnership, we can provide more opportunity; provide the ability to break the cycle of poverty. You play a vital role in this mission every time you bring Mutana Hill home. This is who we are, what we believe, the type of people we believe in. We look forward to building this new relationship with Long Miles Coffee and seeing the impact it can have on the lives of the people in Burundi.

We are with you always Burundi.

We welcome you to buy a bag of this delicious coffee and join us to do our part in bringing stability to these families.

The Abakundakawa (“Those Who Love Coffee”) Rushashi Coffee Cooperative, located in the northern mountainous region of the district of Gakenke, is situated at an altitude of 1700-1900 meters and encompasses five distinct zones. The coffee cooperative was formed in 2004 and due to a strong women’s movement became the first Women’s Farmer Association of its kind in Rwanda.

The women of Hingakawa have seen one of the darkest periods of Rwandan history. Since this group includes both Hutu and Tutsi, the women made a decision to make poverty their mutual enemy rather than each other; and with this sentiment, they have been able to move forward and heal their community through their leadership.

After the coffee farms in Rwanda were left fallow for a time, several organizations assisted the farmers to be able to produce coffee once again. Hingakawa, as the name suggests (“Let’s Grow Coffee”), is more of a chant than it is a mere statement.

It is a resolution to fight an epidemic that has crippled and claimed lives of numerous households: Poverty. These women have had enough and have come together to yell out loud “LET’S GROW COFFEE” together and reclaim our lives.

Like every corner of this world, the African continent continues to jump leaps and bounds to shun itself from a continent that is historically known for the “rule of man”. Commonly and recently still referent to as the last frontier where women still have no rights; where dignity is a hard earned thought. When a country like Rwanda goes through a devastating genocide, it was not uncommon to hear skeptics, analysts and so-called experts refer to it as “stateless...hopeless; a country just as dotted on the map in size, is just as easy to erase off the map” – and on and on. Infuriating as it must have been to hear time and time again it added an overwhelming feeling of forlornness.

However, as relevant as it is, this is not a story of how they got there; it’s a story of who was daring enough to plant seeds of hope at the bedrock soils of underlying skulls; “The Women Coffee Farmers of Rwanda” If you had a cup of coffee today, chances are that it was planted, tendered, picked, delivered, harvested, processed, sun-dried, sorted, hulled, analyzed, bagged, transported, counted, roasted, re-bagged, ground, steeped, handcrafted, and served to you by a woman. Coffee, just like humans, has a high natural deliquescent microcosm, where the line between character and contamination is extremely fickle. After the genocide, Rwanda stood at the crossroads of the latter microcosm.

Society was broken; its only chance of survival was to have a change of heart as a society – a complete overhaul. Equality and reconciliation was not just an option, but an absolute necessity.

Coffee farmers were one of the first pillars of society that wholly embraced the trickle down messages of equality and the banishment of archaic patriarchal from the leadership of women – a cultural risk that is often not given its due credit of exemplary courage where equality is otherwise seen as taboo. A courage that is partially and significantly responsible in stitching the hearts and minds of a once torn society; a courage desperately needed in re-stitching an industry tearing at the seams of sustainability, transparency and quality. The role of women in coffee can no longer be undermined, unnoticed, or gone un-incentivized. The trick is getting to know “who” they are.

We are proud to introduce you to the brave women of Hingakawa Women’s Coffee. The journey of both the producers and product are fully traceable by a third party traceability verifier. The details to chain of custody tracking allow us to recognize these incredible women and understand what makes this coffee as special as it tastes.